


haunted

by bluecarrot



Category: Hamilton - Miranda
Genre: Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-28
Updated: 2016-12-28
Packaged: 2018-09-07 18:55:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 627
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8812246
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bluecarrot/pseuds/bluecarrot
Summary: The best way to silence Hamilton was (maybe) not the best way.





	

**Author's Note:**

> written 12/10/2016.

The thing is: Hamilton dies.

The thing is: Hamilton is _dead_. 

 _Dead_ means he doesn't come back. _Dead_ means Hamilton isn't there when Burr goes back to work, finishing his term as Vice-President, being intensely polite and watching Jefferson's eyes roll in his head over it. _He looks at me like I'm stupid,_ Burr wants to tell Hamilton. _I'm not stupid._ He would laugh to see Burr's steadfast courtesy meeting the increasingly-overt derision of Jefferson. He would have laughed, Burr thinks.

But Burr shot Hamilton, and he's buried, and that means --

 

Burr's walked past Trinity Churchyard a dozen dozen times, often deliberately. Mostly he passes it in the rain, so he has an excuse to keep down his head and let the brim of his hat block out his face. Sometimes he stops by to visit -- his wife is buried there, after all; it's a perfectly good reason. Not that he needs a reason. What is Hamilton to him?

His victim. His nothing.

"I must speak to him," he'd said, after his voice returned; he watched Alexander crumple over and said to himself: "I must speak to him."

"You must flee," said Van Ness; he shook Burr by the arm until Burr realized it and turned, blinking. "You must go, Aaron, they will arrest you --"

So he fled. And Hamilton died. Their final words to each other were "Your choice of weapons, sir" (Hamilton) and "The sun is just up; shall we commence?" (Burr). 

In retrospect, being arrested doesn't seem so bad.

 

The city collects funds and erects a ridiculous grave-monument to Hamilton, and it's so unattractive that Burr laughs in his sleeve -- the marble stands out like a sore thumb in the narrow paths and gentle curves of the graveyard; it's excessively suitable.

It doesn't matter. Burr doesn't linger close to it. He doesn't want to appear he's wracked with some kind of guilt. Haunted.

Last week a woman spit on him in the street. "I hope you lay awake in the dark!" she shouted afterwards, while he was staring at the white stain in disbelief. "Murderer! Villain!"

Someone had pulled her away, staring at Burr like he would leap after and stab her to death right there in the open -- well, why not? Maybe he ought to start carrying a dirk. Maybe he _ought_ to kill more people. Why not?

 

He does lay awake in the dark but not for the reason she wants: it's loss, not guilt, that wracks him. It's the silence in the house, the letters that won't come again. He keeps Hamilton's last letter to him. His own letter -- as close as he came to begging, as close as he was able to come -- Alex sent it back unopened. _I thought you maintained the honor of a soldier and a gentleman,_ Aaron had written. It came back. Hamilton hadn't bothered to read it.

Burr keeps it tucked away with the others.

 

Maybe he's done Hamilton a service, all things considered? Hamilton was a mocked figure before the final duel. Now he is revered, beloved, monumented. No one remembers his arguments and his temper and his terrible drunken singing or how bad he was at chess. They remember Hamilton through Burr's action; they remember nothing about Burr but that single bullet.

 _Murder was the kindest thing I could have done for your reputation_ , he says, silence to silence. He wants to reverse their roles. He aches to claw through the dirt pull him up and touch him again, shake him until the worms fall out, to press his mouth against the cold bones.  _Speak to me,_   _goddamn you -- speak --_ he says without words to wordless Hamilton

who is dead

who sleeps peaceful in the earth

even as Burr walks above him, pacing.

**Author's Note:**

> "So now you're sleeping peaceful?  
> I'll lie awake and pray  
> You'll be strong tomorrow & will see another day  
> And we will praise it."


End file.
